The Now Beginning

In terms of our equations, energy and consciousness and matter are one. And in those terms (the qualifications are necessary) — consciousness is the agent that directs the transformation of energy into form and if form into energy. All possible visible or invisible particles that we discover or imagine — meaning hypothesized particles — possess consciousness. They are energized consciousness.

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There are certain characteristics inherent in energy itself, quite aside from any that we ascribe to it, since of course to date we do not consider energy conscious.

Energy is above all things infinitely creative, innovative, original. Energy is imaginative. (Any scientists who might be reading this blog may as well stop here.) I am not assigning human traits to energy. Instead, our human traits are the result of energy’s characteristics — a rather important difference. Space as we think of it is, in our terms, filled with invisible particles. They are the unstated portion of physical reality, the un-manifest medium in which our world exists. In that regard, however, atoms and molecules are stated, though we cannot see them with our [ unaided ] eye. The smaller particles that make them up become “smaller and smaller,” finally disappearing from the examination of any kind of physical instrument, and these help bridge the gap between un-manifest and manifest reality.

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For the terms of this discussion of the beginning of our world, I will deal with known qualities for now — the atoms and molecules. In the beginning they imagined the myriad of forms that were physically possible. They imagined the numberless cells that could arise from their own cooperative creation. Energy is boundless. It is exuberant. It knows no limits. In those terms, the atoms dreamed the cells into physical being — and from that new threshold of physical activity cellular consciousness dreamed of the myriad organizations that could emerge from this indescribable venture.

Again, in actuality all of this took place at once, yet the depth of psychological experience contained therein can never be measured, for it involved a kind of value fulfillment with which each consciousness is involved. That characteristic of value fulfillment is perhaps the most important element in the being of All That Is, and it it a part of the heritage of all species.

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Value fulfillment itself is most difficult to describe, for it combines the nature of a loving presence — a presence with the innate knowledge of its own divine complexity — with a creative ability of infinite proportions that seeks to bring to fulfillment even the slightest, most distant portion of its own inverted complexity. Translated into simpler terms, each portion of energy is endowed with an inbuilt reach of creativity that seeks to fulfill its own potentials in all variations — and in such a way that such a development also furthers the creative potentials of each other portion of reality.

In those terms, then, there was in the beginning an almost unimaginable time in which energized consciousness, using its own creative abilities, its own imagination, experimented with triumphant rambunctiousness, trying out one form after another. In those terms we are used to thinking of, nothing was stable. Consciousness as we think of it turned into matter, and then into pure energy and back again.

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Subjectivity still largely ruled. Like an adolescent leaving home for the first time, individualized consciousness was also somewhat homesick, and returned often to the family homestead — but gradually gained confidence and left finally to form a universe.

Now because All That IS contains within itself such omnipotent, fertile, divine creative characteristics, all portions of its subjective experience attained dimensions of actuality impossible to describe. The thoughts, for example, of All That Is were not simply thoughts as we might have, but multidimensional mental events of superlative nature. Those events soon found that a transformation must occur, if they were to journey into objectivity — for no objectivity of itself could contain the entire reality of subjective events that existed within divine subjectivity. Only in that context could their relative perfection be maintained. Yet they had yearned before the beginning for other experiences, and even for fulfillment of a different nature. They sensed a kind of value fulfillment that required of them the utilization of their own creative abilities. They yearned to create as they had been created, and All That Is, in a kind of divine perplexity, nevertheless realized that his had always been its own intent.

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All That IS realized that such a separation would also allow us to bring about a different kind of divine art, in which the creators themselves created, and their creations created, bringing into actuality existences that were possible precisely because there would seem to be a difference between the creator and the creations. All That Is is, therefore, within each smallest portion of consciousness.

Yet each smallest portion of consciousness can uniquely create, bring into being, eccentric versions of All That Is, that in certain terms All That Is, without that separation, could not otherwise create. The loving support, the loving encouragement of the slightest probable consciousness and manifestation — that is the intent of All That Is.

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All That Is knows that even this purpose is a portion of a larger purpose. In terms of time, the realization of that purpose will emerge with another momentous explosion of subjective inspiration into objectivity, or into another form. In deeper terms, however, that purpose is also known now, and to one extent or another the entire universe dreams of it, as once cellular consciousness dreamed of the organs that it might “form.”

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I want to stress that I am speaking here not so much about a kind of spiritual evolution as I am about an expansion. We will for now, however, confine ourselves to discussion of consciousness in the beginning of the world, stressing that the first basis of physical life was largely subjective, and that the state of dreaming not only helped shape the consciousness of our species, but also in those terms served to provide a steady source of information to man and woman about his/her physical environment, and served as an inner web of communication among all species.

 

The year 2020, and the idea of time and of dates seems to be indelibly mixed into everyone’s psychology

We can remember last year, and to some extent recall the past years of our lives. It appears to us that our present consciousness wanders backward into the past, until finally we can remember no longer — and on a conscious level, at least, we must take the very event of our birth under secondhand evidence. Few people have conscious memory of it.

For the purpose of our discussion, I must necessarily couch this blog to some degree in the framework of time. I must honor our specifics. Otherwise my blog readers would not understand what I am trying to say.

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Even though this blog is being written within time’s tradition, therefore, I must remind you that basically that tradition is not mine — and more, basically, it is not yours either.

In the deepest of terms, and in ways that quite scandalize the intellect when it tries to operate alone, the beginning is now. That critical explosion of divine subjective into objectivity is always happening, and we are being given life “in each moment” because of the simultaneous nature of that divine subjectivity.

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I hope that in other portions of my blogs certain mental exercises will allow us to leap over the tradition of time’s framework and sense with the united intellect and intuitions our own individual part in a spacious present that is large enough to contain all of time’s segments.

Assuming that the big-bang origin of the universe was a hot event

Theoretical physicists have charted how the first explosion may have ” evolved” from one with temperature well in excess of 100,00 million degrees Kelvin into a cooler one of “only” a few thousand degrees Kelvin around 500,000 years later, so that atoms could begin to form.

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One less prominent theory The “inflationary model,” which may become much better known. It incorporates many of the features of the big-bang theory, and actually may answer certain questions in a better scientific fashion. One of the big differences between the two is that in the big-bang theory all of matter in the universe was already present, though existing in an extremely dense state which then began to expand; the inflationary model suggests that the universe was created out of nothing, or out of just about nothing — meaning that through unforeseeable rhythms sub-atomic particles spontaneously came into being as matter. A fantastic, inflationary expansion then began. Yet this creation of matter out of nothing, so to speak, violates at least some of the laws of conservation — laws that are indeed among the most basic and chemical tenets of physics.

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I don’t necessarily believe in either the big-bang or inflationary models of the creation of the universe, even though material in my blogs may be evocative of portions of both theories. In physics, we’re asked to believe that this “extremely dense state” which began to expand was in actuality many billions of times smaller than a proton. (Protons are subatomic components of the nuclei of atoms.) Matter is a form of energy. Even so, I have trouble conceptualizing the idea that all matter in our universe, out to the farthest-away galaxy of billions of stars, grew from this unimaginably small and dense, unimaginably hot “original” state or area of being. I can see how such a concept can be postulated mathematically — but could it ever have really happened in ordinary terms?

Imagine a body with a fully operating body consciousness

A body not diseased or defective, but without the overriding ego-directed consciousness that we have. The sleepwalker’s physical abilities surpassed ours. They were as agile as animals, their purpose simply to be. Their main points of consciousness were elsewhere, their primary focuses scarcely aware of the bodies they had created. Yet they learned ‘through experience,’ and began to ‘awaken,’ to become aware of themselves, to discover time, or to create it.

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The sleepwalkers were not asleep to themselves, only from our viewpoint. There were several such races of human beings. To them the real was the dream life, which contained the highest stimuli. This is the other side of our own experience. Such races left the physical earth much as they found it. In what we would call the physical waking state, these individuals slept, yet they behaved with great natural physical grace. They did not saddle the body with negative beliefs of disease or limitation. They did not age to the extent that we do.

The creationists put down other species, as the evolutionist

I’d say that both the creation and evolution models suffer from logical and emotional sloppiness, and that neither one presents a reasonable view of man’s or woman’s origins. Both concepts seem equally implausible when we think of them with any objectivity, and neither can be proven, of course. They ultimately rest upon the faith of the believer.

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We cannot prove scientifically that our world was created by a god who set in into motion, but remained outside of its dominion. Nor can we prove scientifically that the creation of the world was the result of a chance occurrence — so we will not be able to prove what I am going to tell you either. Not in usual terms.

I hope however to present, along with my explanations, certain hints and clues that will try to arouse within our own consciousnesses memories of events with which our own inner psyches were intimately involved as the world was formed — and though these may appear to be past events, they are even now occurring.

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Before the beginning of the universe, we will postulate the existence of an omnipotent, creative source. We will hope to show that this divine subjectivity is as present in the universe. I refer to this original subjectivity as All That Is. I am making an attempt to verbalize concepts that almost defy the edges of the intellect, unless that intellect is thoroughly reinforced by the intuition’s strength. So you will need to use your mind and your own intuitions as you read this blog.

All that is, before the beginning contained within itself the infinite thrust of all possible creations. All That Is possessed creativity of such magnificence that its slightest imaginings, dreams, thoughts, feelings or moods attained a kind of reality, a vividness, an intensity, that almost demanded freedom. Freedom from what? Freedom to do what? Freedom to be what?

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The experience, the subjective universe, the “mind” of All That Is, was so brilliant, so distinct, that All That Is almost became lost, mentally wandering within this ever-flourishing, ever-growing interior landscape. Each thought, feeling, dream, or mood was itself indelibly marked with all of the attributes of this infinite subjectivity. Each glowed and quivered with its own creativity, its own desire to create as it had been created.

Before the beginning there existed an interior universe that had no beginning or ending, for I am using the term “before the beginning” to make matters easier for the reader to assimilate. The same infinite interior universe exists now, for example.

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All That Is contained within itself the knowledge of all existences, with their infinite probabilities, and “as soon as” All That Is imagined those numberless circumstances, they existed in what I will call divine fact.

All that is knew of itself only. It was engrossed with its own subjective experiences, even divinely astonished as its own thoughts and imaginings attained their own vitality, and inherited the creativity of their subjective creator. Those [thoughts and imaginings] began to have a dialogue with their “Maker”

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Thoughts of such magnificent vigor began to think their own thoughts — and their thoughts thought thoughts. As if in divine astonishment and surprise, All That Is began to listen, and began to respond to these “generations” of thoughts and dreams, for thoughts and dreams related to each other also. There was no time, so all of this “was happening” simultaneously. The order of events is being simplified. In the meantime, then in our terms. All That Is spontaneously thought new thoughts and dreamed new dreams, and became involved in new imaginings of interweaving and interrelating thoughts and dreams that “already” existed.

So beside this spontaneous creation, this simultaneous “stream” of divine rousing. All That Is began to watch the interactions that occurred among his own subjective progeny. He listened, began to respond and to answer a thought or a dream. He began to purposefully bring about those mental conditions that were requested by these generations of mental progeny. If he had been lonely before, he was no longer.

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Our language cause some difficulty here, so please accept the pronoun “he” as innocuously as possible. “It” sounds too neutral for my purpose, and I want to reserve the pronoun “she” for later differentiations. In basic terms, of course, All That Is is quite beyond any designations having to do with anyone species or sex. All That Is, then, began to feel a growing sense of pressure as it realized that its own ever-multiplying thoughts and dreams themselves yearned to enjoy those greater gifts of creativity with which they were innately endowed.

It is very difficult to try to assign anything like human motivation to All That Is. I can only say that it is possessed by “the need” to lovingly create from its own being; to lovingly transform its own reality in such a way that each most slight probable consciousness can come to be; and with the need to see that any and all possible orchestrations of consciousness have the chance to emerge, to perceive and to love.

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We will later in future blogs discuss fuller connotations of the word “love” as it is meant here, but this blog is a kind of outline of other material to come.

All That Is, then, became aware of a kind of creative tumult as each of its superlative thoughts and dreams, moods and feelings, strained at the very edges of their beings, looking for some then-unknown, undiscovered, as of then unthought-of release. I am saying that this mental progeny included all of the consciousnesses that have ever appeared or will appear upon our earth — all tenderly couched: the first human being, the first insect — each with an inner knowledge of the possibilities of its development. All That Is, loving its own progeny, sought within itself the answer to this divine dilemma.

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When that answer came, it involved previously unimaginable leaps of divine inspiration, and it occurred thusly: All that Is searched through the truly infinite assortment of its incredible progeny to see what conditions were needed for this even more magnificent dream, this dream of a freedom of objectivity. What door could open to let physical reality emerge from such an inner realm? When All That Is, in our terms, put all of those conditions together it saw, of course, in a flash, the mental creation of those objective worlds that would be needed — and as it imagined those worlds, in our terms, they were physically created.

All That Is did not separate itself from those worlds, however, for they were created from its thoughts, and each one has divine content. The worlds are all created by that divine content, so that while they are on the one hand exterior, they are on the other also made of divine stuff, and each hypothetical point in our universe is in direct contact with All That Is in the most basic terms. The knowledge of the whole is within all of its parts — and yet All That Is is more than its parts.

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Divine subjectivity is indeed infinite. It can never be entirely objectified. When the worlds, ours and others, were thus created, there was indeed an explosion of unimaginable proportions, as the divine spark of inspiration exploded into objectivity.

The first “object” was an almost unendurable mass, though it has no weight, and it exploded, instantaneously beginning processes that formed the universe — but no time was involved. the process that we might imagine took up eons occurred in the twinkling of an eye, and the initial objective materialization of the massive thought of All That Is burst into reality. In our terms this was a physical explosion — but in the terms of the consciousnesses involved in that breakthrough, this was experienced as a triumphant “first” inspirational frenzy, a breakthrough into another kind of being.

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The earth then appeared as consciousness transformed itself into the many facets of nature. The atoms and molecules were alive, aware — they were no longer simply a part of a divine syntax, but they spoke themselves through the very nature of their being. They became the living, aware vowels and syllables through which consciousness could form matter.

But in our terms this was still largely a dream world, though it was fully fashioned. It had, generally speaking, all of the species that we now know. These all correlated with the multitudinous kinds of consciousnesses that had clamored for release, and those consciousnesses were spontaneously endowed by All That Is with those forms that fir their requirements. We had the birth of individualized consciousness as we think of it into physical context. Those consciousnesses were individualized before the beginning, but not manifest. But individualized consciousness was not quite all that bold. It did not attach itself completely to its earthly forms at the start, but rested often within its “ancient” divine heritage. In our terms, its is as if the earth and all of its creatures were partially dreaming, and not as focused within physical reality as they are now.

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For one thing, while individualized consciousness was within the massive subjectivity of All That IS, it enjoyed, beside its own uniqueness, a feeling of supporting unity, a comforting knowledge that it was its source. So in the beginning of our world, consciousness fluctuated greatly, focusing gently at the start, but not quite as willing to be as fully independent as its first intent might seem.

We had the sleepwalkers, early members of our species, whose main concentration was still veiled in that earlier subjectivity, and they were our true ancestors, in those terms.

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For one thing, early man and woman needed to rely upon his or her inner knowledge.

The universe began tomorrow

The universe will begin yesterday. The universe began tomorrow. Both of these statements are quite meaningless. The tenses are wrong, and perhaps our time sense is completely outraged. Yet the statement: “The universe began in some distant past, ” is, in basic terms, just as meaningless.

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In fact, the first two statements, while making no logical sense, do indeed hint of phenomena that show time itself to be no more than a creative construct. Time and space are in a fashion part of the furniture of our universe.

The very experience of passing moments belongs to our psychological rooms in the same way that clocks are attached to our walls. Whenever science or religion seeks the origin of the universe, they search for it in the past. The universe is being created now. Creation occurs in each moment, in our terms. The illusion of time is being created now. It is therefore somewhat futile to look for the origins of the universe by using a time scheme that is in itself, at the very least, highly relative.

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Our now, or present moment, is a psychological platform. It seems that the universe began with an initial burst of energy of some kind. Evolutionists cannot account for its cause. Many religious people believe that a god exists in a larger dimension of reality, and that he or she created the universe while being himself or herself outside of it. He or she set it into motion. Many individuals, following either persuasion, believe that regardless of its source, the universe must run out of energy. Established science is quite certain that no energy can now be created or destroyed, but only transformed (as stated in the first laws of thermodynamics). Science sees energy and matter as being basically the same thing, appearing differently under varying circumstances.

In certain terms, science and religion are both dealing with the idea of an objectively created universe. Either God “made it,” or physical matter, in some unexplained manner, was formed after an initial explosion of energy, and consciousness emerged from that initially dead matter in a way yet to be explained.

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Instead, consciousness formed matter. Each atom and molecule has its own consciousness. Consciousness and matter and energy are one, but consciousness initiates the transformation of energy into matter. In those terms, the “beginning” of our universe was a triumph in the expansion of consciousness, as it learned to translate itself into physical form. The universe emerged into actuality in the same way, but to a different degree, that any idea emerges from what we think of as subjectivity into physical expression.

The consciousness of each reader of this blog existed before the universe was formed: — but that consciousness was un-manifest. Our closest approximation — and its is an approximation only — of the state of being that existed before the universe was formed is the dream state. In that state before the beginning, our consciousness existed free of space and time, aware of immense probabilities. This is extremely difficult to verbalize, yet it is very important that such an attempt be made. Our consciousness is a part of an infinitely original creative process.

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I will purposely avoid the word “God” because of the connotations placed upon it by conventional religion. I will make an attempt to explain the characteristics of this divine process throughout this blog. I call the process “All That Is.” All That Is is so much a part of its creations,” for each creation also carries indelibly within it the characteristics of its source.

If we have thought that the universe followed a mechanistic model, then we would have to say that each portion of this “cosmic machine” created itself, knowing its position in the entire “future construction.” We would have to say further that each portion came gladly out of its own source individually, neatly tailored to its position, while at the same time that individual source was also as intimately the source of each other individual portion.

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I am not saying that the universe is the result of some “psychological machine,” either, but that each portion of consciousness is a part of All That Is, and that the universe falls together in a spontaneous, divine order — and that each portion of consciousness carries within it indelibly the knowledge of the whole.

The birth of the world represented a divine psychological awakening. Each consciousness that take a part in the physical universe dreamed of such a physical existence, in our terms before the earth was formed. In greater terms than ours, it is quite true to say that the universe is not formed yet, or that the universe has vanished. In still vaster terms, however, the fact is that in one state or another of the universe has always existed.

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Our closest approximation of the purpose of the universe can be found in those loving emotions that we have toward the development of our children, in our intent to have them develop their fullest capacities.

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Our finest aspirations can give us some dim clue as to the great creative thrust that is behind our own smallest act, for our own smallest act is possible only because our body has already been provided for in the physical world. Our life is given. In each moment it is renewed. So smoothly and effortlessly do we ride that thrust of life’s energy that we are sometimes scarcely aware of it. We are not equipped with a certain amount of energy that then wears out and dies. Instead we are, again, newly created in each moment.

Be a practicing idealist if you are to remain a true idealist for long

We must take small practical steps, often when we would prefer to take giant ones — but we must move in the direction of our ideals through action. Otherwise we will feel disillusioned, or powerless, or sure, that only drastic, highly unideal methods will ever bring about the achievement of a given state or situation.

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Life at all levels of activity is propelled to seek ideals, whether of a biological or mental nature. That pursuit automatically gives life its zest and natural sense of excitement and drama. Developing our own abilities, whatever they may be, exploring and expanding, our experience of selfhood, gives life a sense of purpose, meaning, and creative excitement — and also adds to the understanding and development of the society and the species.

It is not enough to meditate, or to imagine in our mind some desired goal being accomplished, if we are afraid to act upon the very impulses to which our meditations and imaginings give rise. When we do not take any steps toward an ideal position then our life does lack excitement. We become depressed. We might become an idealist in reverse, so that we find a certain excitement in contemplating the occurrence of natural disasters, such as earthquakes.

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We may begin to concentrate our attention on such activities. We may contemplate the end of the world instead, but in either case we are propelled by a sense of personal frustration, and perhaps by some degree of vengeance, seeing in our mind the destruction of a world that fell so far beneath our idealized expectations.

None of the unfortunate situations discussed in my blog, have any power over us, if we understand that events do not exist by themselves. All events and situations exist first within the mind. At the deepest levels of communication no news is secret, whether or not we receive it by way of our technological gadgets.

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Our thoughts and beliefs and desires form the events that we view on television. If we want to change our world, we must first change our thoughts, expectations, and beliefs. If every reader of this blog changed his or her attitudes, even though not one law was rewritten, tomorrow the world would have changed for the better. The new laws would follow.

Any new law always follows the change in belief. It is not the other way around.

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There is no civilization, no system of science, art, or philosophy, that did not originate in the mind. When we give lip service to ideas with which we do not agree, we are betraying our own ideals, harming oneself to some extent, and society as well, insofar as we are denying oneself and society that benefit of our own understanding. Each person is an idealist. I simply want to help us practice our idealism in the acts of our daily life.

Each person alive helps paint the living picture of civilization as it exists at any given time, in our terms. “Be your own best artist”. Our thoughts, feelings and expectations are like the living brush strokes with which we paint our corner of life’s landscape. If we do our best in our own life, then we are indeed helping to improve the quality of all life. Our thoughts are as real as snowflakes or raindrops or clouds. They mix and merge with the thoughts of others, to form man’s and woman’s livingscape, providing the vast mental elements from which physical events will be formed.

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As we learn to allow our impulses some freedom, we will discover their connection with our own idealized version of what life should be. We will begin to discover that those spontaneous urges are as basically good and life-giving as the physical elements of the earth that provide the impetus for all biological life.

Beyond that, however, those impulses, connect us with the original impulses from which all life emerges.

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We will discover the natural, cooperative of our impulses, and we will no longer believe that they exist as contradictory or disruptive influences. Our impulses are part of the great multi-action of being. At deeper levels, the impulse portion of the personality is aware of all actions upon the earth’s surface. We are involved in a cooperative venture, in which our slightest impulse has a greater meaning, and is intimately connected with all other actions. We have the power to change our life and the world for the better, but the methods that are worthy of them. Science and religion have each contributed much to man’s and woman’s development. They must also reevaluate their ideals and methods, however.

In larger terms, there are really only scientific and religious men and women, however, and fields of science and religion would be meaningless without those individuals who believe in their positions. As those men and women enlarge their definitions of reckless in pursuit of the ideal — reckless enough to insist that each step we take along the way is worthy of that ideal.

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We will understand, if we are a practicing idealist, that we cannot kill in the name of peace, for if we do so our methods will automatically undermine our ideal. The sacredness of life and spirit are one and the same. We cannot condemn the body without ultimately condemning the soul. We cannot condemn the soul without ultimately condemning the body.

I would like each of my Blog readers to be practicing idealist, and if you are then you will automatically be tolerant of the beliefs of others. You will not be unkind in the pursuit of your own ideals. You will look upon the world with a sane compassion, with some humor, and you will look for man’s and woman’s basic good intent. You will find it. It has always been there. You will discover your own basic good intent, and see that it has always been behind all of your actions — even in those least fitted to the pursuit of your private ideals.

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The end does not justify the means. If we learn that lesson, then our good intent will allow us to act effectively and creatively in our private experience, and in our relationships with others. Our changed beliefs will affect the mental atmosphere of our nation and the world.

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We must encounter the selves that we are now. Acknowledge our impulses. Explore their meanings. Rely upon ourselves. We will find far greater power, achievement, and virtue than we suppose.

The tree of life, of reptiles turning into birds….

If science wants to talk about the tree of life, then we have certainly got the right to see all — or at least most — of the leaves on the tree, not just those at the tips of the branches. Meaning of course, that many of those invisible leaves would represent the missing, physical, intermediate forms demanded by evolutionary theory.

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Some of us keep searching for some remote spiritual inner self that we can trust and look to for help and support, but all the while we distrust the familiar self with which we have such intimate contact. We set up divisions between portions of the self that are unnecessary.

There are many schools for spiritual advancement that teach us to “get rid of the clutter of our impulses and desires,” to show aside the self that we are in search of a greater idealized version. First of, the self that we are is ever-changing and never static. There is an inner self in the terms of those definitions, but that inner self, which is the source of our present being, speaks through our impulses. They provide in-built spiritual and biological impetuses toward our most ideal development. We must trust the self that we are , now.

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If we would know oneself in deepest terms, we must start with our own feelings, emotions, desires, intent and impulses. Spiritual knowledge and psychic wisdom are the natural result of a sense of self-unity.

Impulses are inherently good, both spiritually and biologically. They emerge from Framed-mind-2, from the inner self, and they are based on the great inner web-work of communication that exists among all species on our planet. Impulses also provide the natural impetus toward those patterns of behavior that serve us best, so that while certain impulses may bunch up toward physical activity, say, others, seemingly contradictory, will lead toward quiet contemplation, so that overall certain balances are maintained.

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Some people are only aware of — or largely aware of — impulses toward anger, because they have inhibited those natural impulses toward love that would otherwise temper what seemed to be aggressive desires. When we begin trusting ourselves, we start by taking it for granted that to some extent at least we have not trusted oneself or our impulses in the past: We have thought that impulses were dangerous, disruptive, or even evil. So as we begin to learn self-trust, we acknowledge our impulses. We try them on for size. We see where they lead us by allowing them some freedom. We do not follow urges through that would hurt others physically, or that seem in direct contradiction to our present beliefs — but we do acknowledge them. We do try to discover their source. Behind them we will almost always find an inhibited impulse — or many of them — that motivated us to move in some ideal direction, to seek a love or understanding so idealized in our mind that it seemed impossible to achieve. We are left with the impulse to strike out.

If we examine such troublesome stimuli, we will always find that they originally rose after a long process, a process in which we were afraid to take small positive steps toward some ideal. Our own impulses naturally lead us to seek creative fulfillment, the expansion of our consciousness, psychic excursions, and the conscious knowledge and manipulation of our dreams.

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No methods will work if we are afraid of our own impulses, or of the nature of our own being. Most of us understand that All That Is is within us, that God is within creation, within physical matter, and that “He” or “She” does not simply operate as some cosmic director on the outside of reality. We must understand that the spiritual self also exists within the physical self in the same fashion. The inner self is not remote, either — not divorced from our most intimate desires and affairs, but instead communicates through our own smallest gesture, through our smallest ideal.

This sense of division within the self forces us to think that there is a remote, spiritual, wise, intuitive inner self, and a bewildered, put-upon, spiritually ignorant, inferior physical self, which happens to be the one we identify with. Many of us believe, moreover, that the physical self’s very nature is evil, that its impulses, left alone, will run in direct opposition to the good of the physical world and society, and fly in the face of the deeper spiritual truths of inner reality. The inner self then becomes so idealized and so remote that by contrast the physical self seems only the more ignorant and flawed. In the face of such beliefs the ideal of psychic development, or astral travel, or spiritual knowledge, or even of sane living, seems so remote as to be impossible. We must, therefore, begin to celebrate our own beings, to look to our own impulses as being the natural connectors between the physical and the nonphysical self. Children trusting their impulses learn to walk, and trusting our impulses, we can find ourselves again.

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Consciousness predates physical forms. Consciousness predates the physical universe. Consciousness predates all of its manifestations.

The impulse to be, in any terms that we understand, is without beginning or end. What we have in our physical species are the manifestations of inner species of being, or creative groupings originated by consciousness as material patterns into which consciousness then flows. In those terms, the world came into being and the species appeared in a completely different framework of activity than is imagined, and one that cannot be scientifically established — particularly within those boundaries with which science has protected itself.

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The patterns for the earth and for its creatures were as real before their physical appearances, and far more real than, say, the plan for a painting that we might have in our mind. The universe always was innately objective in our terms, with its planets and creatures. The patterns for all of the species always existed without any before or after arrangement.

I am not pleased with those analogies, but sometimes they are all I can use to express issues so outside of normal channels of knowledge. It is as if, then, the earth, with all of its species, existed in complete form as a fully dimensioned cosmic underpainting, which gradually came alive all at once. Birds did not come from reptiles. They were always birds. They expressed a certain kind of consciousness that sought a certain kind of form. Physically the species appeared — all species appeared — in the same way that we might imagine all of the elements of a highly complicated dream suddenly coming alive with physical properties. Mental images — in those terms, now — existed that “in a flash of cosmic inspiration” were suddenly endowed with full physical manifestation.

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To that extent, the Bible’s interpretation is correct. Life was given, was free to develop according to its characteristic conditions. The planet was prepared, and endowed with life. Consciousness built the forms, so life existed within consciousness for all eternity. There was no point in which chemicals or atoms suddenly acquired life, for they always possessed consciousness, which is life’s requirement.

In the terms that we can understand, all species that we are aware of appeared more or less at once, because the mental patterns had peaked. Their vitality was strong enough to form differentiation and cooperation within the framework of matter.

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I understand that it appears that species have vanished, but again we must remember probabilities, and that those species simply “developed” along the patterns of probable earths. We are not just dealing with a one-line development of matter, but of an unimaginable creativity, in which all versions of our physical world exist, each one quite convinced of its physical nature. There are ramifications quite unspeakable, although in certain states of trance, or with the aid of educated dreaming, we might be able to glimpse the inner complications, the web-works of communications that connect our official earth with other probable ones. We choose our time and focus in physical reality again and again, and the mind holds an inner comprehension of many seemingly mysterious developments involving the species.

Even the cells are free enough of time and space to hold an intimate framework of being within the present, while being surrounded by this greater knowledge of what we think of a the earth’s past. In greater terms, the earth and all of its species are created in each moment. We wonder what gave life to the first egg or seed, or whatever, and think that an answer to that question would answer most others; for life, we say, was simply passed on from that point.

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But what give life to the egg or the seed now, keeping it going, provides that energy? Imagining some great big-bang theory (to explain the creation of the universe) gives us an immense explosion of energy, that somehow turns into life but must wear out somewhere along the line — and if that were the case, life would be getting weaker all the time, but it is not. The child is as new and fresh today as a child was 5,000 years ago, and each spring is as new.

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What gives life to chemicals now? That is the most proper question. All energy is not only awarized but the source of all organizations of consciousness, and all physical forms. These represent frameworks of consciousness. There was a day when the dreaming world, in our terms, suddenly awakened to full reality as far as physical materialization is concerned. The planet was visited by desire. There were ghost excursions there — mental buildings, dream civilizations which then became actualized.

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There is much left unsaid.

The blueprints for “ideal” development exist within the pool of genetic knowledge

The ideal blueprints provide the species with multitudinous avenues for fulfillment. Those blueprints exist mentally as ideals. They express themselves through the impetus and creativity of the species’ individual members.

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Our natural athletes, for example, show through their physical expertise certain ideal body conditions. They may personify great agility or strength or power: individual attributes, physical ideals which are held up to others for their appreciation, and which signify, to whatever extent, abilities inherent in the species itself.

I believe that man and woman runs the mile much quicker now than he or she did, say, thirty years ago. Has the body’s effective speed suddenly quickened? Hardly. Instead, mental beliefs about the body’s performance have changed, and increased physical speed resulted. The body can indeed run faster than the current record (of 3:39). I merely want to show effect of beliefs upon physical performance. All people do not want to be expert runners, however. Their creativity and their ideals may lie in quite different fields of endeavor, but individual performance always adds to the knowledge of the species. Good, better, best. Is it bad to be a poor runner? Of course not, unless running is your own particular avocation. And if it is , you improve with practice.

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Now our ideals, whatever they may be, initially emerge from our inner experience, and this applies to the species as a whole. Our ideas of society and cooperation arise from both a biological and spiritual knowledge given us at birth. Man and woman recognized the importance of groups after observing the animals’ cooperation. Our civilizations are our splendid, creative, exterior renditions of the inner social groupings of the cells of the body, and the cooperative processes of nature that give us physical life. This does not mean that the intellect is any less, but that it uses its abilities to help us form physical civilizations that are the reflections of mental, spiritual, and biological inner civilizations. We learn from nature always, and we are a part of it always.

Our searches toward understanding excellent performance in any area — our idealisms — are all spiritually and biologically ingrained. If many of the conditions we have mentioned are less than ideal in our society, then we can as an individual begin to change those situations. We do this by accepting the rightness of our own personhood. We do this by discarding ideas of unworthiness and powerlessness, no matter what their sources. We do this by beginning to observe our own impulses, by trusting our own direction. We start wherever we are, today.

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We do not dwell upon the unfortunate conditions in our environment, but do take steps in our own life to express our ideals in whatever way is given. Those ways are multitudinous.

Generally speaking, for example, If you are seriously worried about a physical condition, go to a doctor, because your own beliefs may over frighten you otherwise. Begin with innocuous but annoying physical conditions, however, and try to work those out for yourself. Try to discover why you are bothered. When you have a headache or a simple stomach upset, or if you have a chronic, annoying but not serious condition, such as trouble with you sinuses, of if you have hay fever — in those situations, remind yourself that your body does indeed have the capacities to heal itself.

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Do these exercises to discover what conditions of a mental nature, or psychological origin, are causing distress. instead of taking an aspirin for a headache, sit down, breathe quietly, and remind yourself that you are an integral part of the universe. Allow yourself to feel a sense of belonging with nature. Such an exercise can often relieve a headache in no time. But each such experience will allow us to build up a sense of trust in our own body’s processes.

Examine the literature that you read, the television programs that you watch, and tell yourself to ignore those indications given of the body’s weaknesses. Tell yourself to ignore literature or programs that speak authoritatively about the species’ “killer instincts.” Make an effort to free your intellect of such hampering beliefs. Take a chance on your own abilities. If we learn to trust our basic integrity as a person, then we will be able to assess our abilities clearly, neither exaggerating them or under assessing them.

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We will not feel the need, say, to “justify our existence” by exaggerating a particular gift, setting up the performance of one particular feat or art as a rigid ideal, when in fact we may be pleasantly gifted but not greatly enough endowed with a certain ability to give us the outstanding praise we think we might deserve.

On the other hand, there are many highly gifted people who continually put down their abilities, and are afraid to take one small step toward their expression. If we accept the rightness of our life in the universe, then our ideals will be those in keeping with our nature. They will be fairly easily given expression, so that they add to our own fulfillment and to the development of the society as well.

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Our impulses are our closest communication with our inner self, because in the waking state they are the spontaneous urgings toward action, rising from that deep inner knowledge of oneself that we have in dreams. We were born because we had the impulse to be. The universe exists because it had the impulse to be. There was no exterior cosmic Pied Piper, singing magical notes or playing a magical tune, urging the universe into being. The urge to be came from within, and that urge is repeated to some extent in each impulse, each urge toward action on the part of man and woman or molecule. If we do not trust the nature of our impulses, then we do not trust the nature of our life, the nature of the universe, or the nature of our own being.

Any animal knows better than to distrust the nature of its own life, and so does any infant. Nature exists by virtue of faith. The squirrels gather nuts in the faith that they will have provisions, in the faith that the next season will come, and that spring will follow winter. Our impulses are immersed in the quality called faith, for they urge us into action in the faith that the moment for action exists. Our beliefs must interact with our impulses, however, and often they can erode that great natural beneficial spontaneity that impulses can provide.

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When I speak of impulses, many of you will automatically think of impulses that appear contradictory or dangerous or “evil” — and that is because we are so convinced of the basic unworthiness of our being. We have every right to question our impulses, to choose among them, to assess them, but we must be aware of them, acknowledge their existence, for they will lead us to our own true nature. this may involve a lengthy journey for some of us, with our belief systems for many of our impulses now are the result of the pressure caused by perfectly normal unacknowledged ones in the past. But our impulses reflect the basic impulse of our life. Even if they appear contradictory at any given time, overall they will be seen to form constructive patterns toward action that point more clearly towards our own clear path for fulfillment and development.

Natural attributes show themselves quite clearly in early childhood, for example, when we are allowed greater freedom to do what we want to do. As children, some people love to work with words, some with images, some with objects. Some show great ability in dealing with their contemporaries, while others naturally lean toward solitude and private meditations. Look back toward the impulsive behavior of your childhood, toward those activities that mostly pleased you.

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If you painted pictures, this does not mean that you necessarily should be an artist. Only we the strength of those impulses — but if they are intense and consistent, then pursue them. If you end up simply painting as a hobby, that will still enrich your life and understanding. If your impulses lead you toward relationships with others, then do not let fears of unworthiness stand in your way. It is very important that we express our idealism actively, to whatever extent we can, for this increases our sense of worth and power.

Such action serves as a safeguard so that we do not overemphasize the gaps that may exist in oneself or in society, between the reality and the ideal condition. Many people want to change the world for the better, but that ideal seems so awe-inspiring that they think they can male no headway unless they perform some great acts of daring or heroism, or envision themselves in some political or religious place of power, or promote an uprising or rebellion. The ideal seems so remote and unreachable that, again, sometimes any means, however, reprehensible, eventually can seem justified. To change the world for the better, we must begin by changing our own life. There is no other way.

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We begin by accepting our own worth as a part of the universe, and by granting every other being that same recognition. We begin by honoring life in all of its forms. We begin by changing our thoughts toward life in all of its forms. We begin by changing our thoughts toward our contemporaries, our country, our family, our working companions. If the ideal of loving our neighbor like oneself seems remote, we will at least absolutely refrain from killing our neighbor — and our neighbor is any person on the face of the planet.

We cannot love our neighbor, in fact, until we love oneself, and if we believe that it is wrong to love oneself, then we are indeed unable to love anyone else.

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For a start we will acknowledge our existence in the framework of nature, and to do that we must recognize the vast cooperative processes that connect each species with each other one. If we truly use our prerogatives as an individual in our country, then we can exert far more power in normal daily living than we do now. Every time we affirm the rightness of our own existence, we help others. Our mental states are part of the planet’s psychic’s atmosphere.

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A note: Our exterior civilizations do indeed mirror and reflect the great cellular civilizations, so that we try to exteriorize that kind of order and creativity.

Many of our technological advances — all of them, for that matter — are rather interpretations of the inner mechanisms of nature: sonar, radar, and so forth, as we attempt to physically or objectively reproduce the inner realities of nature. It is sometimes almost impossible to verbally describe civilizations of scent, civilizations built upon temperature variations, alphabets of color, pressure gradations — all of these highly intimate and organized, but quite outside of verbal representation.

In our lives, anything we want is possible within the contours of our natures, if only we understand that this is so.

 

Physically death gives life

All biological organisms know that physical life depends upon a constant transformation of consciousness and form. This biological knowledge is intimately acknowledged at microscopic levels. Even our cells know that their deaths are necessary for the continuation of our physical form.

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The entire orientation is strange or alien only to our conscious belief systems. in one way or another, most people are aware of a desire for death before they die — a desire they usually do not consciously acknowledge. To a large measure, the sensations of pain are also the results of our beliefs, so that even diseases that are indeed accompanied, now, by great pain, need not be. Obviously, I am saying that “deadly” viruses do not “think of themselves” as killers, and more than a cat does when it devours a mouse. The mouse may die, and a cell might die as a result of the virus, but the connotations applied to such events are also the result of beliefs. In the greater sphere of spiritual and biological activity, the viruses are protecting life at their level, and in the capacity given them.

In one way or another, they are always invited in response to that greater rhythm of existence in which physical life is dependent upon constant transformation of consciousness and form.

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The phase of death is, then, a part of life’s cycle. I have mentioned evolutionary experiments, as we think of evolution. There is a disease that I have read about recently, where the skin turns leathery after intense itching — a fascinating development in which the human body tries to form a leathery-like skin that would, if the experiment continued, be flexible enough for, say, seat pose and normal locomotion, yet tough enough to protect itself in jungle environments from the bites of many “still more dangerous” insects and snakes. Many such experiments appear in certain stages as diseases, since the conditions are obviously not normal physical ones. To some extent, cancer also represents a kind of evolutionary experiment. But all such instances escape us because we think of so-called evolution as finished.

Some varieties of our own species were considered by the animals as diseased animal species, so I want to broaden our concepts there. In the entire natural scheme, and at all levels — even social or economic ones — disease always has its own creative basis. Abnormalities of any kind in birth always represent probable versions itself — and they are kept in the gene pool to provide a never-ending bank of alternates.

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There are all kinds of interrelationships. So-called Mongoloid children, for example, are reminders of man’s and woman’s purely emotional heritage, as separate from his or her intellectual achievements. They often appear more numerously in industrialized civilizations for that reason

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The disease I referred to is Onchocerciasis, which is caused by a filarial parasite spread by the bite of the blackfly. Beside producing the gruesome leathery skin, Onchocerciasis can cause blindness — hence its common name, river blindness. This most serious affliction appears to be centered in West Africa, and infects many millions of people there. Four centuries ago, it was carried to the Western Hemisphere by slaves, and is now found in certain areas of Mexico, south to Brazil.

Onchocerciasis doesn’t kill, and the percentage of victims who lose their sight varies according to location. Perhaps in this biological experiment, the blindness represents an evolutionary dead end, in those terms.

Very few people really act from an evil intent

Any unfortunate situations in the fields of medicine, science, or religion result not from any determined effort to sabotage the “idea,”” but instead happen because men and women often believe that any means is justified in the pursuit of the ideal.

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When science seems to betray us, in our society, it does so because its methods are unworthy of its intent — so unworthy and so out of line with science’s prime purpose that the methods themselves almost amount to an insidious anti-scientific attitude that goes all unrecognized. The same applies to medicine, of course, when in its worthy purpose to save life, its methods often lead to quite unworthy experimentation, so that life is destroyed for the sake of saving, say, a greater number of lives. On the surface level, such methods appear sometimes regrettable but necessary, but the deeper implications far outdo any temporary benefits, for through such methods men and women lose sight of life’s sacredness, and begin to treat it contemptuously.

We will often condone quite reprehensible acts if we think they were committed for the sake of a greater good. We have a tendency to look for outright evil, to think in terms of “the powers of good and evil,” and I am quite sure that many are convinced of evil’s force. Evil does not exist in those terms, and that is why so many seemingly idealistic people can be partners in quite reprehensible actions, while telling themselves that such acts are justified, since they are methods toward a good end.

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That is why fanatics feel justified in their actions. When we indulge in such black-and-white thinking, we treat our ideals shabbily. Each act that is not keeping with that ideal begins to unravel the ideal at its very core. If we feel unworthy, or powerless to act, and if we are idealistic, we may begin to feel that the ideal exists so far in the future that it is necessary to take steps we might not otherwise take to achieve it. And when this happens, the ideal is always eroded. If we want to be a true practicing idealist, then each step that we take along the way must be worthy of our goal.

In our country, the free enterprise system is immersed in strange origins. It is based upon the democratic belief in each individual’s right to pursue a worthy and equitable life. But that also became bound up, with Darwinian ideas of the survival of the fittest, and with the belief, then, that each individual must seek his or her own good at the expense of others, and by the quite erroneous conception that all of the members of a given species are in competition with each other, and that each species is in further competition with each other species.

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The “laws” of supply and demand are misconceptions based upon a quite uncomplimentary belief in man’s and woman’s basic greedy nature. In the past we treated the land in our country as if our species being the “fittest,” had the right to survive at the expense of all other species, and at the expense of the land itself. The ideal of the country was and is an excellent one: the right of each individual to pursue an equitable, worthy existence, with dignity. The means, however, have helped erode that ideal, and the public interpretation of Darwin’s principles was, quite unfortunately, transferred to the economic area, and to the image of man and woman as a political animal.

Religion and science alike denied other species any real consciousness. When man and woman spoke of the sacredness of life — in his or her more expansive moods — he or she she referred to human life alone. We are not in competition with other species, nor are we in any natural competition with ourselves. Nor in the natural world in any way the result of competitiveness among species. If that were the case we would have no world at all.

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Individually, we exist physically because of the unsurpassed cooperation that exists just biologically between our species and all others, and on deeper levels because of the cellular affiliations that exist among the cells of all species. Value fulfillment is a psychological and physical propensity that exists in each unit of consciousness, propelling it toward its own greatest fulfillment in such a way that its individual fulfillment also adds to best possible development on the part of each other such unit of consciousness. This propensity operates below and within the framework of matter. It operates above as well, but I am here concerned with the cooperative nature with which value fulfillment endows all units of consciousness within our physical world.

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While we believed in competition, then competition became not only a reality but an ideal. Children are taught to compete against each other. The child naturally “competes” against herself or himself in an urge to outdo old performance with new. Competition, however, has been promoted as the ideal at all levels of activity. It is as if we must look at others to see how we are doing — and when we are taught not to trust our own abilities, then of course we need the opinions of others overmuch. I am not speaking of any playful competition, obviously, but of a determined, rigorous, desperate, sometimes almost deadly competition, in which a person’s value is determined according to the number of individuals he or she has shunted aside.

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This is carried through in economics, politics, medicine, the sciences, and even the religions. So I would like to reinforce the fact that life is indeed a cooperative venture, and that all the steps taken toward the ideal must of themselves be life-promoting.

People often respond to the seasons in individualistic fashion, of course, using certain elements to spur them on or hold them back. No season is itself only. It exists in relationship to all the people within its boundaries.